


adventures in abandonment

by yhighon



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Child Abandonment, Family Issues, Gen, Good Sibling Technoblade (Video Blogging RPF), Hurt/Comfort, Piglin Hybrid Technoblade (Video Blogging RPF), Sleepy Bois Inc as Family, Wilbur Soot-centric, lapslock, phil tries his best but mans has his own issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-15 00:13:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28554432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yhighon/pseuds/yhighon
Summary: wilbur watches them go, waving next to an enthusiastic tommy, standing outside their house until they disappeared into the woods.he never knows where they go. off to adventures too dangerous for him and tommy, the two always left behind. and though he knows that they can’t follow him, that techno is the obvious choice out of the three of them, wilbur wants to ask why their father has to leave at all.(wilbur and techno are both babysitting, in different ways. they finally talk about it.)
Relationships: Technoblade & Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Wilbur Soot & Technoblade, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Comments: 8
Kudos: 254





	adventures in abandonment

wilbur watches them go, waving next to an enthusiastic tommy, standing outside their house until they disappeared into the woods.

he never knows where they go. off to adventures too dangerous for him and tommy, the two always left behind. and though he knows that they can’t follow him, that techno is the obvious choice out of the three of them, wilbur wants to ask why their father has to leave at all.

it becomes obvious, every few months, that phil gets the itch, the need to go somewhere other than here, the need to get away. wilbur once asked him why he felt that way, but the answer was nowhere near satisfying. 

“i’ve spent my whole life traveling, wil, it’s really hard for me to stay in one place.” phil had said, without elaborating any further.

it’s easier to think of him as phil, instead of dad, a friend that comes and goes, instead of the father that was supposed to stay and take care of them.

that was the promise, all that time ago.

but every few months (weeks, recently, and he’s afraid it’ll soon be days), phil and techno leave, off to have a family trip with just the two of them, wilbur left behind to take care of tommy.

he’s thought about taking tommy and leaving, more than once, but tommy wouldn’t want to leave and wilbur doesn’t either, not really. he just gets angry sometimes, angry at being left to take care of a child that he barely even likes, left to take care of himself at barely fifteen.

he tries not to mention it to phil. having him around is almost worse than when he’s gone.

“we get to hang out!” tommy excitedly says next to him, loud as ever. wilbur smiles down at him, ignoring the twisting knife in his stomach. 

“yeah! want to listen to my new song?” wilbur asks. music has always been the common ground, a part of himself that’s easy to offer up when he’s falling apart.

“yeah! come on, wilby!” tommy says, and they head inside. wilbur tries not to worry about techno and phil, instead focusing on the kid in front of him, crooked teeth and dirty blonde hair.

he never asked to have tommy as a brother, never really asked for a family. but anything is better than being alone in the house, when there are so many things just lying around for him to do. watching over tommy is a distraction, and the kid never leaves him alone, a blessing and a curse all at once.

eventually, it’s time for dinner. they don’t have a clock, but wilbur guesses it’s about the time phil would start cooking, the sun about to go down. 

so wilbur makes the last of the food in the house, resolving to go hunting tomorrow. phil had left them with weapons (“just in case,” he’d said) and it wouldn’t be that difficult. tommy was getting better with a sword, and could use the practice. wilbur hated fighting, but he would have to feed them somehow.

sparring was something they used to do together, him and techno, before the gap in skill became too big. wilbur almost never won, something that didn’t bother him until he saw how phil looked at techno, pride in his eyes.

that was right before techno and phil left together for the first time. they don’t spar together anymore.

as much as wilbur resented techno, he didn’t blame him. the piglin hybrid always craved violence, in a way that he couldn’t help, couldn’t control. he was never scared of techno, but almost every animal in the vicinity was, running away at the first crunch of leaves underfoot.

at first, he thought that phil was taking techno to fight, to let out any violent urges he might have. as time went on, it became increasingly obvious it was for more selfish reasons. 

phil had taken them all in, but it was becoming increasingly obvious that he didn’t know what to do with children, much less three boys with their own sets of problems. the only one that was gonna turn out even relatively normal was tommy, who phil had so graciously rescued early in life, before the misery had really set in.

“wilbur?” tommy asked. he was burning dinner. hastily he took it off the stove, cutting off burnt ends before giving it to tommy.

“bon appetit.” he says, with a forced smile. tommy seems to pick up on something in his expression, but doesn’t say anything, much more preoccupied with the food in front of him.

there had only been enough for one of them, but wilbur isn’t hungry anyways. he’s writing down song lyrics for something new, and they’re suspiciously angry. he throws away the page.

he knows that phil and techno are probably doing something dangerous, hunting down a rare creature or looking for scarce materials. they’ll come back with stories, glory surrounding them as they regale them with how they fought a monster.

tommy loves those stories. wilbur lost interest a long time ago.

eventually tommy falls asleep, his head laying on wilbur’s lap, while the older boy is staring at what he’s written, on a new page, a new attempt.

_dear phil and techno,_

__

__

_we aren’t coming back._

he crumples it a second later, being careful not to wake tommy. his hands crush it into a tiny ball and throw it to the other edge of the room, landing next to one of phil’s chests.

he’ll burn it later. 

he falls asleep not long later, tear tracks burned into his skin and shame written across pages torn out of a book. 

it’s maybe a week later that techno and phil come back, looking slightly worse for wear. techno looks drained, holding his sword down by his side, half his armor missing. phil looks pleased with himself, holding some sort of object in his hands. 

“you’re back!” tommy shouts, running out into the grass to meet them. wilbur remains in the doorway, arms crossed. techno gives him a concerned look, and they make eye contact, before his brother turns back to phil and tommy.

“let’s go inside,” phil says, “and i’ll tell you everything that happened.” 

they end up in the main room of the house, techno and phil on the couch, tommy squished in the middle. wilbur sits on the other side of the room, on the floor, back against the wall.

“-and then, the monster came for me, but techno saved me, and we managed to get this!” phil says excitedly, holding a nether star in his hands. tommy looks at it in awe. techno looks exhausted.

“that’s so cool! can i go with you next time?” tommy asks. phil looks over at wilbur.

“oh, tommy, i’d love to have you, but wilbur needs your company. it gets lonely when you’re all by yourself, just like i was before i found you guys.” their father says, and wilbur wants to hit him, for making him the reason. for making him the bad guy when tommy is almost all that he has left.

they make eye contact, and wilbur can tell, that phil understands. that he knows it’s selfish, to leave all the time. as much as that may be true, wilbur knows he won’t stop.

phil used to tell them adventures of his younger self, dangerous missions that he made exciting and new with fancy words. back then, it had been time to bond, time for the three of them to sit around their father and listen to his stories.

now, wilbur can only ever think about escape. he knows phil is thinking the same thing.

near the end of the epic retelling of their adventure, wilbur leaves the main room. he disappears to his room, strumming a few lone chords and trying to make music.

when that isn’t enough, he leaves their house, moving towards the cliff that’s a little ways away. it’s nice to sit at, to swing his feet over the edge and throw rocks into the ocean below.

the area is lit with torches, so there aren’t too many mobs once night rolls around, allowing wilbur to stay at the cliff. he keeps an eye out for them in order to not get knocked off his perch, ever watchful due to phil’s warnings, but none come even close. he can see far away endermen, a spider’s eyes glowing in the trees, but nothing seems to notice him.

it’s a while after that someone comes to sit next to him, taking a seat in the dirt.

“yes, i kept tommy alive.” wilbur says, a rebuttal to phil’s inability to take anything seriously.

“i noticed.” his brother says, looking over at him.

“i thought you were phil.” he says, an unsaid apology on his lips. techno nods.

“that much was obvious.” 

“what do you want?” wilbur asks, not unkindly. 

“wanted to make sure you were okay.” techno says, and it’s not quite the answer wilbur had been expecting.

“i’m fine.” he says.

“uh huh. y’know, wilbur, you always act like you’re so hard to crack, but it’s starting to be really obvious.” techno says, the words blunt, said like he was telling him their house was made of wood.

“maybe to you, techno.” it’s petty, but wilbur doesn’t want to be the adult anymore, after a week of looking after tommy.

“phil worries about you.” techno says, hesitant like he isn’t sure this is information that wilbur is supposed to have.

“no he doesn’t.” and wilbur doesn’t mean it in an angsty teenager way, the way that most would. it isn’t supposed to mean he doesn’t care, because phil does care. it’s meant in the way that phil says he’s proud, the way he says that wilbur has always known what to do. the way he tells wilbur that he’s been an adult since he was born. the way that he thinks wilbur has it all under control, has everything figured out. it means that he doesn't have to worry about him. it’s meant to be a compliment, when phil says it. wilbur only feels bitterness hearing it.

“he does. he just doesn’t know how to show it.” techno argues, and wilbur shrugs next to him.

“well, maybe he should try harder.” wilbur diffuses with a laugh, something breathy they both know is fake.

“why do you hate us so much?” techno asks, and wilbur could flinch at the way he says it.

“i don’t hate you. i never hated you. i’m just tired.” wilbur says, and before he can stop himself he continues. “i’m just tired of being left behind, to watch tommy and be forgotten about.”

“that sounds nice, actually. there are times i don’t want to go with phil.” techno suddenly confesses, looking like he wants the words back the instant they leave his mouth.

“what? come on, you always go with him.” he refutes, because that can’t be right. techno always leaves with phil, looks forward to their adventures and comes back with a similar sort of excitement.

“mostly to make sure he comes back.” techno says, and wilbur feels the night air, cold against his face. “as much as he cares about us, he can’t be tethered to one place for too long. it’s against his nature.”

wilbur thinks back to the note he’d crumpled, burned later. _we’re not coming back._ he wonders if it’s a family trait, somehow passed through a cycle of trauma that only one of them had actually been through.

wilbur doesn’t say anything, not yet ready to excuse phil for his bad decisions, not yet ready to head back to the house. techno continues to sit beside him, watching two skeletons shoot arrows at each other.

“techno, my dear brother, seems i’ve misjudged you.” wilbur says, spinning dramatics onto the sentence so that he doesn't have to admit to anything.

“that’s kinda rude, y’know.” techno replies, turning to face his brother.

“how about next time you get to play babysitter and i get to go on father duty?” he cracks, and techno laughs.

“you wish.”

**Author's Note:**

> uh yeah, have sbi angst while i procrastinate on writing the next installment in my series.
> 
> a lot of this is inspired by my friend just_a_lizard's analysis of sbi, mostly phil and techno
> 
> anyway, have a good day/night, don't abandon your kids <3


End file.
